At 1.25L per month, no takers for MD posts in taluk hospitals

Despite offers of up to Rs 1.25 lakh as salary, specialized doctors are not ready to work in taluk-level hospitals, health minister KR Ramesh Kumar admitted on Monday.TNN | November 22, 2016, 11:45 IST

Belagavi: Despite offers of up to Rs 1.25 lakh as salary, specialized doctors are not ready to work in taluk-level hospitals, health minister KR Ramesh Kumar admitted on Monday.

Replying to questions from the BJP in the legislative council, Kumar said: “We offered Rs 1 lakh per month to doctors, and an additional Rs 25,000 for specialists who can work in the Hyderabad-Karnatak region. But what can a minister do if there are no takers?”

Kumar, however, said the government was working out alternatives by training in-house MBBS doctors, who can take up diploma courses to specialize and they would be posted at taluk hospitals. “We are starting specialized diploma courses and will also keep track of the hundreds of doctors who pass out of the 53 medical colleges in the state,” Kumar said.

The minister told V Somanna and Ganesh Karnik, both BJP, that by January 1, 2017, the government will have two dialysis units in all 146 taluk hospitals in the state. At present, the government has dialysis units in 34 taluk hospitals in the state, with 19 of them being non-functional.

According to the government, not less than 2 lakh people are suffering from kidney problems and at least 20,000 more are being added to this list every year. The government is currently providing services to a paltry 1,078 people in the state. “We will try to reach out to every poor and needy person who requires dialysis. While private hospitals charge Rs 1,300 or Rs 1,400 per cycle, we will charge only Rs 150. There will be no distinction among castes or income groups, everyone will be get the same treatment at the same price,” he said.

Kumar said the government has invited “package” tenders for dialysis units, with the onus of having a nephrologist, support staff of nurses and lab technicians and setting up reverse osmosis units for those who bid for the package. The government will pay these contractors a certain amount on a case by case basis.

The health minister dismissed any possibility of having a tie-up with private hospitals to service people in need of dialysis.

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